File Name Prompts

You can
customize many aspects of Epsilon's behavior when prompting for file
names.

By default, many commands in the Windows version of Epsilon use the
standard Windows common file dialog, but only when you invoke them
from a menu or the tool bar. When you invoke these commands using
their keyboard bindings, they use the same kind of dialog as other
Epsilon prompts.

Set want-common-file-dialog to 2 if you want Epsilon to use
the common file dialog whenever it can. Set
want-common-file-dialog to 0 to prevent Epsilon from ever
using this dialog. The default value of 1 produces the behavior
described above. You can use the force-common-file-dialog
command to toggle whether Epsilon uses a dialog for the next command
only.

The Windows common
file dialog includes a list of common file extensions. You can
customize this list by editing the file filter.txt, putting your own
version in your customization directory (see The Customization Directory).
See the comments in that file for more information. You can also
customize which directory this dialog uses, and how Epsilon remembers
that choice; see the common-open-use-directory variable.

All the remaining variables described in this section have no effect
when Epsilon uses the standard Windows dialog; they only modify
Epsilon's own file dialogs.

The prompt-with-buffer-directory variable
controls how Epsilon uses the current directory at file prompts.
When this variable is 2, the default, Epsilon inserts the current
buffer's directory at many file prompts. This makes it easy to
select another file in the same directory. You can edit the
directory name, or you can begin typing a new absolute pathname right
after the inserted pathname. Epsilon will delete the inserted
pathname when it notices your absolute pathname. This behavior is
similar to Gnu Emacs's. (See the yank-options variable to
modify how Epsilon deletes the inserted pathname.)

A setting of 3 makes Epsilon insert the current buffer's directory
in the same way, but prevents Epsilon from automatically deleting the
inserted pathname if you type an absolute one.

When prompt-with-buffer-directory is 1, Epsilon temporarily
changes to the current buffer's directory while prompting for a file
name, and interprets file names relative to the current directory.
This behavior is similar to the "pathname.e" extension available
for previous versions of Epsilon.

When prompt-with-buffer-directory is 0, Epsilon doesn't do
anything special at file prompts. This was Epsilon's default
behavior in previous versions.

During file name completion,
Epsilon can ignore files with certain extensions. The
ignore-file-extensions variable contains a list of extensions
to ignore. By default, this variable has the value
"|.obj|.exe|.o|.b|", which makes file completion ignore files that
end with .obj, .exe, .o, and .b. Each extension must appear between
"|" characters. You can augment this list using the
set-variable command, described in Variables.

Similarly, the only-file-extensions variable makes
completion look only for files with certain extensions. It
uses the same format as ignore-file-extensions, a list of
extensions surrounded by | characters. If the variable holds a
null pointer, Epsilon uses ignore-file-extensions as above.

Completion also restricts its matches using the
ignore-file-basename and ignore-file-pattern variables,
which use patterns to match the names of files to be excluded. If the
pattern the user types doesn't match any files, due to any of the
various exclusion variables, Epsilon temporarily removes all
exclusions and lists matching files again.

When Epsilon prompts for a file name, the <Space> key performs
file name completion on what you've typed. To create a new file with
spaces in its name, you must quote the space characters by typing
Ctrl-Q before each one, while entering the name, or type "
characters around the file name (or any part containing spaces).

At any Epsilon prompt (not just file prompts), you can type Alt-E to
retrieve your previous response to that prompt. Alt-<Up> or
Ctrl-Alt-P show a list of previous responses. See Command History for complete details. Alt-<Down> or Ctrl-Alt-N
let you easily copy text from the buffer into the prompt (useful when
the buffer contains a file name or URL). See Completion & Defaults
for more information. At most file name prompts, Alt-G will retrieve
the name of the current buffer's file.

When Epsilon shows a dialog containing a list of previous responses,
or files matching a pattern, the list may be too wide for the dialog.
You can generally resize the dialog by simply dragging its border.
This works for most Epsilon dialogs. Epsilon will automatically
remember the size of each dialog from session to session.